What came first, you or the universe? The answer is not only unsettling, but suggestive of something both mysterious and inescapable: that you’re the template for the universe and the laws of nature themselves.

There’s more to life than can be explained by our science. One night, several strange glowing objects caught my attention on the side of the road. I thought they were some of those jack-o’-lantern mushrooms Clitocybe illudens. I squatted down to observe one of them with my flashlight. It turned out to be a glowworm, the luminous larvae of the beetle Lampyris noctiluca. There was a primitiveness in its little segmented body, like a trilobite that had just crawled out of the Cambrian sea 500 million years ago. There we were, the beetle and I, two living objects that had entered into each others’ world. It ceased emitting its greenish light, and I, for my part, turned off my flashlight.

I wondered if our little interaction was any different from that of any other two objects in the universe. It’s true chemistry and physics can tackle the foundations of animal systems, but a full understanding of life can’t be found only by looking at atoms and molecules. Conversely, physical existence can’t be divorced from the life that coordinates sense perception and experience.

This creature and I were connected not only by intertwined consciousness, but by a pattern that’s a template for the cosmos itself. Just as a postage stamp of Elvis would reveal to an alien visitor much more than a frozen snapshot of pop music history, the slug had a tale to tell that could illuminate even the depths of a wormhole. The beetle had little walking legs, and possessed sensory cells that transmitted messages to its brain. Perhaps my existence in its universe was limited to a shadow stabilizing a light in the air. I don’t know. But as I left, I no doubt dispersed into the haze of probability surrounding the glowworm’s little world.

We fail to recognize those special properties of life that make it fundamental to material reality. This view of the world in which life and consciousness are bottom-line in understanding the larger universe—biocentrism—revolves around the way a subjective experience relates to a physical process.

Some of the thrill that came with the announcement that the human genome had been mapped or that we’re close to understanding the “Big Bang” rests in our innate human desire for completeness. But these theories fail to take into account that we’re creating them. It’s the biological creature that fashions the stories and gives names to things. And therein lay the great expanse of our oversight, that science hasn’t confronted the one thing that’s at once most familiar and most mysterious—conscious awareness. As Emerson wrote: “We have learned that we do not see directly, but mediately, and that we have no means of correcting these colored and distorting lenses which we are, or of computing the amount of their errors. Perhaps these subject-lenses have a creative power; perhaps there are no objects.”

A deep problem lurks, too: We’ve failed to protect science against speculative theories that masquerade as fact. “String theory” with new dimensions blowing up in different realms, and “bubbles” shimmering down the byways of the universe are examples of this speculation. Indeed, unseen dimensions (up to a 100 in some theories) are now envisioned everywhere, some curled up like soda-straws at every point in space.

Modern physics has become like Swift’s Kingdom of Laputa, flying precariously above the Earth. When science tries to resolve its conflicts by adding dimensions to the Universe like houses on a Monopoly board, we need to examine our dogmas. But the cracks in the system let the light shine more directly on the mystery of life. The root of this waywardness is always the same—the attempt of physicists to overstep the legitimate boundaries of science. The questions they most lust to solve are actually bound up with the issues of life and consciousness.

If the primary questions of the universe have traditionally been tackled by physicists attempting to create grand unified theories—glamorous as they are—such theories remain an evasion, if not a reversal of the central mystery of knowledge: that the laws of the world somehow produced the observer in the first place!

Our entire education system, even the construction of our language, revolves around a bottom-line mindset that assumes a separate universe “out there.” So the first step is to question the standard view that the universe would exist even if it were empty of life, and absent any consciousness or perception of it. Although there’s strong evidence from disparate sources, we can begin with simple logic. Certainly, great earlier thinkers have insisted that logic alone is all that’s needed to see the universe in a fresh light, not complex equations or $50 billion particle colliders.

Absent the act of seeing, thinking, and awareness, what have we got? Take the seemingly undeniable logic that your kitchen is always there whether or not you’re in it. At night you click off the light and leave. Of course it’s there, unseen, all through the night. Right? But consider: The refrigerator and everything else are composed of a shimmering swarm of matter/energy. Quantum theory tells us that not a single particle actually exists in a definite place. Rather, they merely exist as a range of probabilities that are unmanifest. In the presence of an observer—that is, when you go back in to get a drink of water—each one’s wave function collapses and it assumes an actual position, a physical reality. Until then, it’s merely a swarm of possibilities. If that seems too far out, then forget quantum madness and stay with everyday science. As I discussed in a previous blog, the colors and forms known as your kitchen are seen as they are solely because light interacts with your brain. Its basic 7th grade science. Light doesn’t HAVE any color or visual characteristics at all. So while you may think that the kitchen as you remember it was “there” in your absence, the reality is that nothing remotely resembling it is present when a consciousness isn’t interacting.

Most people imagine the world to exist on its own with an appearance that more-or-less resembles what we ourselves see. Not so, says biocentrism. This “Is it really there?” issue is ancient, and of course predates biocentrism. But biocentrism explains why one view and not the other must be correct. The converse is equally true: Once one fully understands that there’s no independent external universe outside of biological existence, the rest more-or-less falls into place.

The structure of the universe isn’t a mere accident. The laws, constants, and forces of the universe—which could have any values whatsoever—are all exactly what they must be for you to exist.

Lanza's Paper is the Cover Story of Annalen der Physik, which Published Einstein's Theories of Relativity

In his papers on relativity, Einstein showed that time was relative to the observer. This new paper takes this one step further, arguing that the observer creates it. The paper shows that the intrinsic properties of quantum gravity and matter alone cannot explain the tremendous effectiveness of the emergence of time and the lack of quantum entanglement in our everyday world. Instead, it’s necessary to include the properties of the observer, and in particular, the way we process and remember information.

The quest to unify all of physics into a “the theory of everything” has inspired a host of ideas. Now a pioneer in the field of stem cell research has weighed in with an essay that brings biology and consciousness into the mix.

Lanza featured on the Canadian Broadcast Corporation (CBC’s) Ideas, one of the oldest and most respected radio programs in the world

BEYOND BIOCENTRISM: Rethinking Time, Space, Consciousness, and the Illusion of DeathHost Paul Kennedy has his understanding of reality turned-upside-down by Dr. Robert Lanza in this paradigm-shifting hour. Dr. Lanza provides a compelling argument for consciousness as the basis for the universe, rather than consciousness simply being its by-product.

Reception to Biocentrism by Scientists & Scholars

“… Robert Lanza’s work is a wake-up call to all of us”—David Thompson, Astrophysicist, NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center

“The heart of [biocentrism], collectively, is correct…So what Lanza says in this book is not new. Then why does Robert have to say it at all? It is because we, the physicists, do NOT say it–or if we do say it, we only whisper it, and in private–furiously blushing as we mouth the words. True, yes; politically correct, hell no! Bless Robert Lanza for creating this book, and bless Bob Berman for not dissuading friend Robert from going ahead with it…Lanza’s remarkable personal story is woven into the book, and is uplifting. You should enjoy this book, and it should help you on your personal journey to understanding.”—Richard Conn Henry, Professor of Physics and Astronomy, Johns Hopkins University

“It is genuinely an exciting piece of work…and coheres with some of the things biology and neuroscience are telling us about the structures of our being. Just as we now know that the sun doesn’t really move but we do (we are the active agents), so it is suggesting that we are the entities that give meaning to the particular configuration of all possible outcomes we call reality.”—Ronald Green, Eunice & Julian Cohen Professor and Director, Ethics Institute, Dartmouth College

“[Biocentrism] takes into account all the knowledge we have gained over the last few centuries…placing in perspective our biologic limitations that have impeded our understanding of greater truths surrounding our existence and the universe around us. This new theory is certain to revolutionize our concepts of the laws of nature for centuries to come.”—Anthony Atala, renowned scientist, W.H. Boyce Professor, Chair, and Director of the Institute for Regenerative Medicine, Wake Forest University School of Medicine

“Having interviewed some of the most brilliant minds in the scientific world, I found Dr. Robert Lanza’s insights into the nature of consciousness original and exciting. His theory of biocentrism is consistent with the most ancient traditions of the world which say that consciousness conceives, governs, and becomes a physical world.”—Deepak Chopra, Bestselling Author, one of the top heroes and icons of the century

“It’s a masterpiece…combines a deep understanding and broad insight into 20th century physics and modern biological science; in so doing, he forces a reappraisal of this hoary epistemological dilemma…Bravo”—Michael Lysaght, Professor and Director, Center for Biomedical Engineering, Brown University

“Now that I have spent a fair amount of time the last few months doing a bit of writing, reading and thinking about this, and enjoying it and watching it come into better focus, And as I go deeper into my Zen practice, And as I am about half way through re-reading Biocentrism, My conclusion about the book Biocentrism is: Holy shit, that’s a really great book!—Ralph Levinson, Professor, University of California, Los Angeles

From physicist Scott M. Tyson’s bookThe Unobservable Universe

“I downloaded a digital copy of [Biocentrism] in the privacy of my home, where no one could observe my buying or reading such a “New Agey” sort of cosmology book. Now, mind you, my motivation was not all that pure. It was my intention to read the book so I could more effectively refute it like a dedicated physicist was expected to. I consider myself to be firmly and exclusively entrenched in the cosmology camp embodied by the likes of Stephen Hawking, Lisa Randall, Brain Greene, and Edward Witten. After all, you know what Julius Caesar said: Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.” I needed to know what the other camps were thinking so I could better defend my position. It became necessary to penetrate the biocentrism camp.

The book had the completely opposite effect on me. The views that Dr. Lanza presented in this book changed my thinking in ways from which there could never be retreat. Before I had actually finished reading the book, it was abundantly obvious to me that Dr. Lanza’s writings provided me with the pieces of perspective that I had been desperately seeking. Everything I had learned and everything I thought I knew just exploded in my mind and, as possibilities first erupted and then settled down, a completely new understanding emerged. The information I had accumulated in my mind hadn’t changed, but the way I viewed it did— in a really big way.”

I spent a couple of years rolling pennies and eating canned spinach and pasta while I tried to understand the universe.

U.S. News & World Report Cover Story

“…his mentors described him [Lanza] as a “genius,” a “renegade” thinker, even likening him to Einstein.”

“Robert Lanza is the living embodiment of the character played by Matt Damon in the movie Good Will Hunting. Growing up underprivileged in Stoughton, Mass., south of Boston, the young preteen caught the attention of Harvard Medical School researchers when he showed up on the university steps having successfully altered the genetics of chickens in his basement. Over the next decade, he was to be “discovered” and taken under the wing of scientific giants such as psychologist B. F. Skinner, immunologist Jonas Salk, and heart transplant pioneer Christiaan Barnard. His mentors described him as a “genius,” a “renegade” thinker, even likening him to Einstein.”

We’re taught that the universe can be fundamentally divided into two entities: ourselves and that which is outside of us. But you’re not an object — if you divorce one side of the equation from the other you cease to exist.

New experiments suggest part of us exists outside of the physical world. We assume there’s a universe “out there” separate from what we are, and that we play no role in its appearance. Yet experiments show just the opposite.

Ideally, our concepts of nature and God should adapt to our evolving scientific knowledge. Relative to the supreme creator, we humans would be much like the microorganisms we scrutinize under the microscope.

Biocentrism unlocks the cage Western science has unwittingly confined itself. By allowing the observer into the equation opens new approaches to understanding everything from the tiny world of the atom to our views of life and death.

We take physics as a kind of magic and think everything just popped into existence one day out of nothingness. But we’re living through a profound shift in worldview, from the belief that life is an insignificant part of the physical universe, to one in which we’re the origin.

We’re about to be broadsided by the most explosive event in history. But it won’t be rockets that take us the next step. Sometime in the future science life will finally figure out how to escape from its corporeal cage.

Everyone knows that something is screwy with the way we visualize the cosmos. Theories of its origins screech to a halt when they reach the very event of interest — the moment of creation, the “Big Bang.”

If we could see before the first single-cell organism, and after the last man and woman, only you would remain — you, the Great Face behind, that consciousness whose mode of thinking that contains the world.

We think of time and consciousness in human terms. But like us, plants possess receptors, microtubules and sophisticated intercellular systems that likely facilitate a degree of spatio-temporal consciousness.

Did you ever wonder why people like Elvis Presley and Michael Jackson didn’t fare any better than you or I despite all their money, fame, and access to people of wisdom? The answer lies in your own backyard.

It seems natural that someday we’ll make machines that’ll think and act like people. However, for a machine or computer there’s no other principle but physic, and the chemistry of the atoms that compose it.